Jury Says Scott Peterson Deserves to Die for Murder

By DEAN E. MURPHY; Carolyn Marshall contributed reporting from Redwood City for this article.

Published: December 14, 2004

After three days of deliberations and nearly two years of a nationwide obsession with the story of a young fertilizer salesman and his pretty and pregnant wife, the jury in the double-murder trial of Scott Peterson determined on Monday that he should be put to death.

Judge Alfred A. Delucchi, who under California law will formally sentence Mr. Peterson, 32, for killing his wife, Laci, 27, and the fetus, said he would take up the matter at a hearing on Feb. 25.

At the same hearing, the judge will consider motions from Mr. Peterson's lawyers for a new trial and to reduce the penalty to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The judge is required by law to consider the lesser sentence, but his praise for the jury on Monday made that seem unlikely.

''This is the way you saw it, and this is the way it is,'' Judge Delucchi said, his voice cracking with emotion as he addressed the six men and six women of the jury. He added, ''I just can't believe how well you have performed.''

After the jurors were dismissed, a spokesman for Laci Peterson's family said Mr. Peterson ''got what he deserved.''

''What a nightmare,'' said the spokesman, Ron Grantski, who is commonly described as Laci Peterson's stepfather. ''It hasn't changed. It's still a nightmare. It should never have happened.''

On Friday, only six jurors said they favored a death sentence, the jury foreman said at a news conference afterward. But after a weekend with the jurors sequestered in a hotel, the decision fell into place on Monday morning, when the foreman requested several pieces of evidence, including autopsy photographs of Laci Peterson and her fetus. Her body was found in San Francisco Bay without limbs or a head, and the fetus -- which washed ashore separately -- was described by prosecutors as appearing like ''trash.''

''It was very important for me to see that, to be sure of my decision,'' the foreman, Steve Cardosi, a fireman and paramedic, said of the photographs. ''We all passed them around and we looked at them.''

Mr. Peterson, who wept on several occasions during the eight-day penalty phase of his trial, reacted stoically to the reading of the verdict. His parents, Lee and Jackie Peterson, and his half-sister, Janey Peterson, all looked ashen. Seated directly behind Mr. Peterson, they listened in silence and showed no emotion beyond the worry that has burdened them throughout the trial.

Across the courtroom, Laci Peterson's mother, Sharon Rocha, and her companion, Mr. Grantski, as well as Laci Peterson's brother, Brent Rocha, and half-sister, Amy Rocha, were equally subdued, remaining quietly in their seats well after the jury had been dismissed.

Moments before the jury entered the courtroom, Mr. Peterson's lead lawyer, Mark Geragos, crouched in the aisle and spoke in a hushed voice with the Peterson family, his expression somber. Later, speaking briefly outside the courtroom on the Petersons' behalf, Mr. Geragos said the family was disappointed and would appeal, which is automatic in death-sentence cases in California.

''I hope you can understand that it's a very difficult time, and that's all I've got to say,'' Mr. Geragos said.

With the jury's decision, Mr. Peterson is set to join California's death row at San Quentin, the largest in the country, where 641 inmates await execution. Until he is formally sentenced, he will remain in Redwood City at the Maguire Correctional Facility, where he has lived alone in a cell in 3B West, a special unit for prisoners in protective custody. As has been the case since his arrival at the jail in January, he will be allowed one-hour visits twice a week.

The penalty verdict brings closer to an end, at least until the appeals are heard, one of the most talked-about criminal cases in recent American history. The trial managed to sustain intense media interest, particularly on cable television talk shows, even though cameras were not allowed in the courtroom and testimony in the guilt and penalty phases, often dry and tedious, extended over a six-month period.

That Mr. Geragos, a Los Angeles lawyer known for his celebrity clients and media savvy, joined the spectacle on Mr. Peterson's behalf made the case especially irresistible for television's armchair legal analysts. Before taking on Mr. Peterson as a client, Mr. Geragos had described the circumstantial evidence against him as ''damning'' during a television appearance.

More than 850 people were issued media credentials for the trial, and on Monday the regular throng of journalists was joined by dozens of television ''bookers,'' who sought to schedule television appearances by jurors, family members and other key players. Because of the many onlookers from the public outside the courtroom, some television personalities were accompanied on Monday by bodyguards.

Judge Delucchi, with a record of death-penalty trials, is retired but took over the case when it was moved from Modesto, Calif., a farming town where the Petersons lived, to this San Francisco suburb about 70 miles away.

Mr. Peterson's lawyers had argued that it was impossible for him to receive a fair trial in Modesto, where public opinion turned against him almost from the day his wife was reported missing on Dec. 24, 2002. The hostility worsened when he acknowledged an extramarital affair with Amber Frey, a massage therapist from Fresno, that had begun in the weeks leading up to Laci Peterson's disappearance.

Ms. Frey cooperated with the authorities once she learned Mr. Peterson was married and his wife had disappeared, providing some of the most compelling testimony against Mr. Peterson during the trial.

Last Thursday, in urging the jurors to deliver a death sentence, prosecutors replayed some of the taped telephone conversations between Ms. Frey and Mr. Peterson, in which Mr. Peterson could be heard romancing -- and lying to -- Ms. Frey while hundreds of volunteers in Modesto searched for his wife.

Three jurors who spoke with journalists after the proceedings on Monday said Ms. Frey had helped them make up their minds. One, Greg Beratlis, described her testimony as ''a big piece of the puzzle.''

''There are a lot of victims in this,'' Mr. Beratlis said. ''A lot of people were deceived. And that includes his family.''

After Mr. Peterson was convicted on Nov. 12 of first-degree murder in the death of his wife and second-degree murder in the death of the fetus -- and big crowds celebrated the verdicts outside the courthouse here -- his lawyers insisted that a fair hearing in the penalty phase was not possible in Redwood City.

They were unsuccessful, however, in legal efforts, including a petition to the California Supreme Court, to move the penalty phase to Los Angeles, where they believed it would be easier to find jurors who had not been influenced by the media coverage.

Mr. Beratlis and the other jurors said they resented the suggestion that they had reached their verdicts because of public pressure.

''I am going to be O.K. with it,'' said one juror, Richelle Nice, an unemployed mother of four. ''It is a difficult decision, but I know I made the right decision.''

Photo: Scott Peterson's mother, Jackie, left the courthouse in Redwood City, Calif., as a man held a local newspaper announcing the jury's decision. (Photo by Ben Margot/Associated Press)